


Nicotine

by fallendarknight86



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F, Song Reference, Strong Language, Swearing, mature content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-20
Updated: 2014-07-20
Packaged: 2018-02-09 14:41:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1986771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallendarknight86/pseuds/fallendarknight86
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quinn's love for Rachel is worse than nicotine...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nicotine

**Author's Note:**

> This idea was on my mind for a while. It is inspired by the song "Nicotine" by Panic at the Disco...
> 
> Text in bold and italics = song lyrics 
> 
> Text in italics = flashback
> 
>  
> 
> Enjoy!!

** NICOTINE **

When you enter the club, you are suddenly welcomed by the smell of cigarettes and cheap beer that make you twitch your nose in disgust. You can only hope that your clothes won't absorb that much of this stink or it would be hard to justify that to your dads when you were supposed to enjoy a quiet movie night at Kurt's. It was actually Kurt's fault that you found yourself in this "alternative club" instead of sitting on his couch, watching Funny Girl for the umpteenth time.

Holding onto your rape whistle a little tighter, you make your way through the crowd to find a smaller yet empty table, facing the stage and still sorta private compared to the other ones. You find your seat just in time. The lights go off, exception made for a sole pink spotlight who bathes the stage in a warm and mesmerizing light. Your eyes squint a little, adjusting to the new darkness while members of the band take their places on the stage. You see a familiar brunette walk behind the drums set, sit down on her stool and adjust the set before producing a couple of sticks from behind her back. Then, your eyes are caught by the movements on the left. Two other girls grab their guitars - probably a bass is one of those two - and slip the sling over their shoulder to secure their grips around them.

Three members down and one more to show up. A whiff of a familiar scent fills your nose, making your head turn toward the source of such a refreshing scent, but your eyes are not quick enough to get a glimpse of the singer besides their pink hair. You just settle in your seat and face forward, sort of eagerly waiting for the singer to make their appearance.

_3...2...1_

Your heart is inwardly counting down the seconds that separate you from having a clear sight of the singer's face and when you do, it feels like it forgot how to beat. Your throat feels suddenly closing around your vocal chords and your mouth feels like Sahara decided to move there for the night.

Messy pink hair framed a too familiar face. A face that haunted you in your sleep, switching your state of unconsciousness between nightmares and hopeful dreams that made you ache for more. Piercing hazel eyes were scanning the dark crowd, mentally analyzing the environment around her. Quinn Fabray might have been an angel fallen from grace, but had not lost her touch with realty that got her where she was,

"Hello Lima, we are the Skanks and we will keep you company with a few songs, for the rest of the night!" Her voice feels huskier than usual and it makes you wonder how many cigarettes she has had, before mustering the strength to walk onto that stage, how bad you wished she cut thar bad habit, but for some selfish reason you were even more entranced by Quinn when her voice took that raspy tone.

Watching her move onto the stage felt different. She owned that space like she owned the high school hallways. She exuded confidence. She was in her element and she was loving every inch of it. You watched her nod toward her drum girl, before settling in front of the mic and pushing her hair back as soon as the music started.

 **_Cross my heart and hope to die  
_** _**Burn my lungs and curse my eyes**_  
 _**I've lost control and I don't want it back**_

Her husky voice fills your ears, making your body tingle in a familiar pleasure that cannot help but take you back to memories of the summer. A summer that is coming to an abrupt end and is leaving you both in a limbo for the two of you. A limbo that you created, for all the doubts concerning her and Finn.

**_I'm going numb, I've been hijacked  
It's a fucking drag_ **

You watch her dance to the more upbeat rhythm of the song and you cannot help but licking your lips in anticipation. You always found her dancing skills superb, even better than Brittany's who, despite her impeccable technique, lacked the ability to move you like she did. Maybe it was because she lost any inhibition when she danced. Maybe it was because you got to enjoy all the moves she could make with her perfectly trained body. Maybe both. Maybe there was more that you could mot even fathom in that moment.

**_I taste you on my lips and I can't get rid of you  
So I say damn your kiss and the awful things you do_ **

**_Yeah, you're worse than nicotine, nicotine_ **

Her eyes find you in the crowd. Her smile falters and her lips tremble as she sings to you. She sings for you. Her grip on the mic hardens and her body stiffens, although it probably goes unnoticed to most of the people there in the club. Most of them, but they are not you. They do not know that woman on the stage like you do. They do not know her at all and you wonder how much you know her too...

_*************_

_Quinn blew the smoke out of the opened window, forehead pressed against her palm and eyes scanning the darkness outside. Lima was not New York, of course, but at least the stars could be seen and what's better than something that you can admire but not to reach?_

_"You should cut that unhealthy habit, it is not good for your vocal chords and could cause you complications for your health. Don't you care about your life?" A familiar voice came from behind her, still in the messed bed where she had been lying in for the past hours._

_"Careful Berry, you sound like you care." The blonde threw the cigarette out of the window and stretched her arms up and over her head, stretching her sore muscles._

_"I do, Quinn." Rachel pulled the blanket up to her chin and looked away from the naked blonde, who smirked at her embarrassment and just lied back down beside her, not even bothering to put some clothes on._

_"Then what are you doing with him? Do you care about him too, but is it safer to sleep with a girl who won't get you pregnant or does it not count because I am not sticking a dick inside of you?" The ex-cheerleader looked away from her bed companion, briefly remembering how bad and uncomfortable was to feel Puck above her and inside her. She should have given her virginity to a woman._

_"Must you be so crude?" The brunette scoffed and lied back down, tugging the blanket around her and facing away from the blonde._

_"Must you be so evasive and flustered? Ten minutes ago, I had my face between your legs and you were begging for more, now you act as I never saw you naked." Quinn rolled on her side and cupped her face with her palm, turning the girl's face toward her with a gentle firmness. "You know where I stand about us, Rachel, why won't you give this a chance?"_

_"I am just...not ready." The singer muttered and laced their fingers together, before tugging the silent blonde back on top of her to claim her lips with hers._

_*************_

That memory filled your mind like it had happened just mere days before. It had been a rough journey from then on, drawing a deeper line between you and her, that had led you to separate and label your romance as a "summer fling". You tried to move on and start things over with Finn, acting as if you had not given your virginity to Quinn Fabray. As if you heart had not replaced the quarterback with the head cheerleader. As if few intense weeks with Quinn had not meant more than months with him.

 ******_It's better to burn than to fade away_**  
 ** _It's better to leave than to be replaced_**  
 ** _I'm losing to you, baby, I'm no match_**

You wipe your eyes with a subtle movement of your hand, that did not go unnoticed to the ex-blonde on the stage. She turned towards you and started singing the new verse, aiming each of her words to you. Only you. It feels like it is you and her in her room, once again. You hang from her lips like you did few weeks ago when she talked to you about the books she read or the dreams she had.

You could always detect the bittersweetness of her soul, the contradictions between a brilliant mind like hers and a life that was tailored around her to suffocate it. Her room was a perfect picture of that controversy. Pink walls and high bookshelves that used to be her refuge against the world right outside her bedroom door. A Jesus poster surrounded by quotes about the infinity of the universe or metaphysical paintings. A map of the stars was right above her bed, as a sort of reminder of the things she could aim to or that she could never have

*************

_Quinn was lying on her back, reclined comfortably against the pillows with Rachel between her legs, her back to her chest. Fingers were laced under the blanket, which covered their still naked frames, against the brunette's stomach and four eyes were fixed on the bedroom ceiling. The blonde's thumb brushed over the back of Rachel's hand, tracing the small scar she had gotten while playing in the sandbox, when she was a kid._

_"Am I reading correctly? Is there a star with my name right there?" The brunette turned toward the blonde, who smiled softly and pressed a kiss on the tip of her nose._

_"Well it is not that farfetched, don't you think? I still abide to what I said that day in the auditorium. You don't belong here, Rachel." Quinn looked back up at the ceiling and scanned the constellations with her eyes. "You know what is amazing about stars?"_

_"Tell me..." Rachel settled sideways in the blonde's arms, both arms wrapped around her midsection and her ear pressed against her chest, to feel her heart beat._

_"It takes a lot of energy and time for them to originate. It is a collision of atoms that need to be merged together. But when that happens...when a star is born they live fully and they burn. They do not fade away, they keep on burning until their energy starts lowering." Quinn brushed her lips against the brunette's forehead, who nodded gently against her. "When a star burns, it makes you want to burn with them."_

_"Is that how you feel about me?" Rachel met the blonde's eyes with hers, who nodded gently and brushed their lips together for a soft kiss. "Why? Why me?" She whispered against the blonde's lips._

_"Because you are not like anyone else, Rachel. Not every collision among atoms generates a star, but some do and they get to live a life different from others. You are different from any of us and it took me so long to accept it. I was so envious of you, back in sophomore year but then I realized you don't have to be a star to be bathed in its light. You can burn with them...if they let you"_

_*************_

_**Just one more hit and then we're through** _   
_**'Cause you could never love me back** _   
_**Cut every tie i have to you** _   
_**'Cause your love's a fucking drag** _   
_**But I need it so bad** _   
_**Your love's a fucking drag** _   
_**But I need it so bad** _

"I wish you cut that habit or toned it down, at least" You find her in the alley behind the club, leaning against the wall with a Marlboro hanging from her perfect and kissable lips. Her outfit is not as pristine as you remembered, but so is not her hair. Her golden hair that you loved running your fingers through or the wild mane that you held onto, as she took you to new heights of pleasure.

"There are worse things that can drag you down..." Quinn breathed the smoke out and turned her eyes on you, scanning you as if she had an x-ray vision. "Did you come here for one last hit before shoving your happy romance in my face, Berry?"

"Back to the surname basis? I thought we were past that..." You lean against the opposite wall, looking away from her face and mostly her eyes, which can still hurt or mesmerize you like no one else could.

"Would you prefer a nickname? Or maybe one of those names I used to scream when you made me come? Does "Baby" or "Love" suit you better? Did it even mean anything to you or you just liked the idea of having the Head Cheerleader right where you wanted, eating from your palm like a lapdog?" She threw her cigarette to the side and took two steps toward you, invading your personal space.

"That is unfair...you know I was not just playing with you. I gave you my freaking virginity, Quinn! " You almost want to shove her out of her insecurities bubble, but you could not even do that to yourself, so how can you do it with her?

"And I gave you my fucking love, Rachel!! I handed you my heart on a silver plate and you threw it back into my face. I loved you even if I fucking knew you would have never loved me back, not as much you loved your precious Finn. But I stayed and let you drag me into this fantasy where I could have stood by your side, no matter what. Where I could have burnt with you" Her fist slammed against the wall beside your head, making your eyes meet hers, acknowledging every inch of pain filling them. "I stayed because I was addicted to loving you, Rachel...but it only led to you breaking my heart."

She pushed herself off the wall and grabbed another cigarette from her pocket, turning her back to you. "You are worse than nicotine..." You hear her whisper before slipping back inside the club and probably out of your life...

** End **


End file.
